The Hidden Gallery: Chapters 11–12

After lunch they debated the relevant issues with gusto.

“I am having an epiphany about the poor,” Lady Constance proclaimed, stepping daintily over the writhing child.

“Not an ordinary poor person, mind you, but someone who has excelled at being destitute.”

“I told them in the sternest possible terms that they must stop dithering away the hours in those dreadful factories they insist on going to every day, and devote their time to worthier pursuits. Like interior decorating! I am no seamstress, of course, but honestly, how hard could it be to fashion a pretty tablecloth out of some lace? It would lend a touch of badly needed charm to all that squalor. Where on earth is the bellpull?”

“I wish you wouldn’t dawdle so, Margaret! I have been standing here for the better part of a minute. Now draw me a bath, please, and lay out a fresh gown.”

“I have been in the most malodorous surroundings imaginable and feel the need to be thoroughly scrubbed.”

In the melee, the little bird fell off Lady Constance’s hat and disappeared somewhere in the nursery.

Just like the wee mousie in the poem by Mr. Robert Burns, it seemed as if Penelope’s best-laid plans were being thwarted at every turn.

This little-known law of physics is called the Fulcrum of Fortune, and although most people prefer to think of fortune as a wheel that spins, the fulcrum (that is, seesaw) is a more accurate depiction for most of us, since the worse our own luck becomes, the more likely we are to notice the good fortune of those around us and brood about the injustice of it all.

Each delivery brought a fresh torrent of mail to Number Twelve Muffinshire Lane.

Lady Constance returned to her seat and fixed Penelope with a bright, almost manic stare.

“Miss Lumley! Since you are our resident scholar, allow me to ask you a question: What sort of jewelry does one wear to the theater? Are pearls too stuffy? Would emeralds be gauche? If it were the symphony, the answer would be simple: diamonds, diamonds, and more diamonds!”

It hung in a place of honor in the headmistress’s office, where the founder’s wise yet impish face gazed down at any student who happened to end up sitting across from Miss Mortimer’s desk.

“Still thinking about that young fella, eh? Miss Lumley, my advice is to leave him where he is until he’s slept off whatever potent refreshment landed him in the lockup to begin with. If he’s anything like Mr. Clarke, he’ll be ever so sorry and meek as a lamb when he gets out. Maybe it’ll teach him a lesson. Not that being sorry ever made Mr. Clarke change his ways!”

The question of what the lady ought to wear to the theater had been settled with a touch of whimsy: After much deliberation, she had instructed Margaret to whip up a bejeweled satin eye patch and a belted scabbard made of felt and rhinestones, which she planned to wear slung around the skirt of her seaweed green gown.

The question of what the lady ought to wear to the theater had been settled with a touch of whimsy: After much deliberation, she had instructed Margaret to whip up a bejeweled satin eye patch and a belted scabbard made of felt and rhinestones, which she planned to wear slung around the skirt of her seaweed green gown.

Penelope was sorry to have to be privy to this conversation, but alas, the idea that she could be used as a personal secretary had taken root in Lady Constance’s mind.

But the lady had endless trouble deciding what to say; she kept starting and stopping and rewording what Penelope had already written down, until page after page was ruined and had to be copied afresh.

At last the eye patch was finished, and Margaret adjusted it carefully so as not to muss Lady Constance’s elaborately upswept hair.

Even with one eye, she still managed to glower with displeasure.

As pleasant as it was to escape the grating prattle of Lady Constance and the bizarre behavior of Lord Fredrick, it also felt oddly sad to be the one left behind.

As pleasant as it was to escape the grating prattle of Lady Constance and the bizarre behavior of Lord Fredrick, it also felt oddly sad to be the one left behind.

“Awfully interesting, more like it. What an inspiring collection of rogues I met in the clink! I’ve got enough material for twenty plays now.”

“It’s just as you guessed, Miss Lumley. I checked every bookshop from here to Charing Cross. There are no Hixby’s guides, of any kind, anywhere. Nobody’s ever heard of them. What you’ve got there is sui generis.”

As for Madame Ionesco, the missing Gypsy, what with being in jail and all, I haven’t been able to conduct a thorough search for her just yet.